A Game Sustained

173 containing a number of recognisable names play to generate funds for good causes. Thus, those who had reservations about public sport could console themselves that servicemen would benefit directly from the ‘comforts’ purchased through such matches. According to ‘Old Ebor’, an estimated £20,000 (£1.65 million in 2018 prices) was raised by playing matches in the county while the war was in progress. 119 Another aspect of maintaining morale was the effort that went into packaging up cricket equipment and sending it to those fighting overseas, an action which one history considered was ‘almost as an act of forgiveness of those still at home who were able to play.’ This was a role played by the press, some individuals and by Yorkshire County Cricket Club. 120 Cricket thus adapted itself to the moral climate created by all-out war. More philosophically, continuing to play cricket was justified by being closely associated with notions of what many thought the country was fighting for – national traditions. Thus, many considered that by keeping cricket going they were helping to maintain one of the great institutions of the country. One speaker at the annual meeting of the Driffield Cricket Club in May 1916, for example, urged the ‘stay at home boys’ to keep the ground going because allowing it to decline would be a loss, not just for the club, but for the whole community. The following year, the message was even stronger as members were pressed to also keep going in memory of the late Lt-Col. Mortimer CMG, who had shown great interest in the club. The case was made even stronger by the argument – anecdotal and probably never properly tested – that ‘carrying on’ and maintaining the clubs was what those fighting abroad wanted. The game thus sought to cloak itself with patriotism. Even those who played the most intensive form of the game in Bradford were able to point to the hard work undertaken in support of the war in their local area, and clubs to the many men from their ranks who had joined up. Linked to this, it was unsurprising, given the widely-held views that had grown up in the Victorian and Edwardian eras, Concluding thoughts: Cricket, Yorkshire and the Great War